College Football News April 30: College Football Playoff Odds and Ends

This week’s College Football Playoff meetings in North Texas went so smoothly, the committee and conference commissioner wrapped up a day ahead of schedule. Not everything was resolved: the Big 12 still has no clear-cut answer as to how a conference championship game would impact its Playoff standing, nor if a championship with just 10 teams is viable.

Ralph Russo of the Associated Press notes that the Army-Navy Game, played the week after conference championships and bowl announcements, remains unaddressed. Otherwise, the successful first year means steady as she goes into Year 2.

The weekly rankings remain part of the process, which Chris Dufresne of the Los Angeles Times writes is a win for those seeking transparency. This year’s ranking won’t begin until the first Tuesday in November, one week later than a year ago.

This column is from earlier in the week, but well worth the read. Friend of the Site Aaron Torres dives into the three-quarterback controversy that has shrouded everything the defending national champions have done in the offseason.

With Braxton Miller constantly rumored in transfer scenarios but staying in Columbus, and neither J.T. Barrett nor Cardale Jones gaining clear distinction as the No. 1, Urban Meyer has some intriguing possibilities to test. Is playing all three among those possibilities?

Shane Ray and Randy Gregory should both be drafted in Thursday’s opening round of the NFL draft, but a failed drug test for marijuana for Gregory and a misdemeanor citation for possession of marijuana for Ray could be enough to knock one or both into the second round.

What a staggering proposition. Marijuana is decriminalized in 18 states, and legal for non-medical use in four states — two of which host NFL franchises. Given the offenses other NFL players recently were involved in and were signed in free agency, front offices passing on first-round talent over pot seems silly. And, given that in some medical communities, marijuana is used in place of highly addictive painkillers like Vicodin or oxycodone, players using it while sacrificing their bodies for football doesn’t seem like an outlandish trade-off.

The “red flag,” from affront office perspective, is less about marijuana and more about a prospect being able to follow instruction. Arizona Cardinals GM Steve Keim explained to the Associated Press:

“It’s tough, when you see a guy with a tremendous amount of talent but he’s got off-field issues, you’re thinking to yourself, ‘How bad of a kid really is he?’ But at the end of the day, you realize through years of experience that guys either don’t make it because they have off-field issues, they have injuries, they can’t learn or they don’t love it enough.”

Utah and Baylor agreed to a home-and-home series. Yay! The games won’t be played until 2023 and 2024, which means the athletes who will meet in Waco and Salt Lake City for those dates are currently in fourth-through-seventh grades. Boo!